This Is Woman's Work with Nicole Kalil - 026 / Are Your Money Beliefs Holding You Back?

Episode Date: August 12, 2020

Beliefs create behavior and behavior creates results. So, you are either in control of your beliefs and behavior about money, or it is controlling you. In this episode, we dig deep on our beliefs about money and what it may reveal about us (are you getting fidgety yet?). We all have a relationship with money, and like most relationships, it can be purposeful, healthy, and empowering, OR it can be limiting, discouraging, and stressful. Listen in as I share tips on shifting your perspective and making your money work for you, not the other way around. It’s time for us to get confident about money, and it starts right here! This is Woman’s Work To learn more about what we are up to outside of this podcast, visit us at NicoleKalil.com

Coming up on this episode of This Is Woman's Work. So asking yourself things like, what are my patterns around money? What keeps coming up? What do I keep doing? What do I keep experiencing? And of those patterns, are there any that you want to continue and keep going forward? Are there any that you want to break? Hello friends, I'm Nicole Kalil and you are listening to the This Is Woman's Work podcast. Today we're going to address a complicated, oftentimes polarizing, super uncomfortable, and even

relationship-ending topic. Take a deep breath, settle in, and I'd ask that you keep an open mind because today we are going to talk about money. Yes, you heard that right, money. Most of us have been taught or socialized to avoid the topic, but I'm not very good at listening when people tell me what to do or when they tell me what not to do. So here we go. If you've listened to episode three on family planning, you already know that Jay and I make a point to talk about money on at least a quarterly basis as part of our family planning process.

So my goal today is not to talk about that again, but rather to share forward some learnings, both about my relationship with money, and side note, you have a relationship with money too, whether it's a purposeful, designed, developed, or strategic relationship with money or a default from your past, no control over relationship with money, it's irrelevant. You have a relationship with money, whether you choose it or not. So I want to talk about the things that I've learned about my relationship with money, as well as how Jay and I interact with money within our relationship. So let's start with my beliefs and really more importantly, your beliefs about money. Because we know that beliefs create behaviors and behavior creates results. It goes like that in all aspects of life, not just with money, but it is certainly true with money. Whether they're conscious or unconscious

beliefs or conscious or unconscious behaviors or conscious or unconscious results. One is leading to the other. So I would ask what came up for you when you heard that today's topic was about money? Was it an image? Did you have a physical response or reaction? Did it trigger a belief or a thought, a memory? Whatever it was, I'd ask if you would sit with that for a second. What was your initial response, your first reaction when you heard we were talking about money? Was it a good one? Did you feel energized and excited? Was it a difficult reaction? Did you feel depleted, low energy, frustrated? Whatever it is, sit with that for a second, because I think that's probably a first sign

or a first tell about your current relationship with money. What I believe to be true and what has worked for me or what I've learned over the course of my life is how I view money, how you view money, what we believe about it may be the single biggest contributing factor to where we are, where you are, where I am financially. So let's play that out with a few examples. If you believe that money equates to greed or people who have money are greedy or if people have a lot of money that they must be greedy or taking advantage of people, that belief is playing a part in your relationship and your results with money. It might be playing out that you don't have a lot of it. Why? Because why would you consciously or unconsciously choose to do something that you look down upon? Why would you choose to do something greedy or take advantage of people?

And so it may not be conscious, but if you have that belief about money or about people with money, it's probably a contributing factor to whether or not you have it. Maybe you believe that people who have a lot of money or make a lot of money must be really smart or must be better than you in some way. And I can tell you without a shadow of a doubt that that is absolutely not the case. I know people with a ton of money who are not the brightest bulbs, and I know incredibly smart people who don't have a lot of money. And a lot is relative, I get that, but stay with me here. I also know that there are really wonderful, amazing humans out there that struggle with money. And there are some nasty, not so lovely humans out there that have a good amount of money. And so having money has nothing to do,

or very little to do, with how smart you you are or how good you are or how much better someone is than the other. And I think a lot of people think that the reason they don't have a lot of money is because they're missing something within themselves. And I just have not experienced that to be true. I think anybody can work hard and working hard oftentimes generates income. Not always. I know that to be true as well. So you might be second guessing that. Well, I know people who do incredibly hard work, like people who work in fields or a janitor or a teacher that don't make the money that they deserve, in my opinion, for the amount of effort they put in. And then of course you hear about people who are making bazillions of dollars and don't seem to do much of anything. So I guess my point is, if you think that X needs to happen in order to create Y, X

being whatever we just talked about and Y being money, then that may be contributing. Now, again, I'm not saying that we can just sit around and believe and think our way into a ton of money, but I just want you to check in if you have a belief system about this that might be working against you. I also would challenge you if you think there's a certain amount of money you need to have to live without any worries. And it's usually a number that's bigger than what you're currently making or what you currently have, right? I've talked to a lot of people that have it in their mind if they just made X amount of income

or if they just increased their monthly income by X, then everything would be solved. And again, that is just not always the case. It's contradictory to what I've observed and experienced. I know people who make $50,000 a year who are living within their means, don't have worries, are saving, are happy. And I know people who make $800,000 a year who can't rub two pennies together because they're living way outside of their means. They're constantly stressed. They're constantly moving money around to try to make things work and they have nothing but worries. So if you have it in your mind that a certain number will give you a worry-free lifestyle, I'd challenge you on that. Another example is if you think money is the most

important thing. If your belief system is that money makes everything else work, well, you might be operating at the expense of some relationships. You might be stepping over people. You might be damaging people. You might be sitting around thinking that so-and-so has too much money, as if you're the decider of what too much is is or that you have any concept of what they might be doing with that money. And again, if you think there is a too much money, then it may be contributing to how much you have. And finally, for sure, your childhood and what you

learned about money or didn't learn about money from your parents is absolutely playing a part in your belief systems. And again, your belief systems are contributing to your behaviors and your behaviors are contributing to your results. So whether you grew up extremely poor or with a ton of money, if you've had the experience of there's never enough of money or that you're entitled to money or that it's better to be conservative or take a ton of risks, whatever it is that you experienced in your childhood, I guarantee it that it is contributing to your belief systems around money, whether it's consciously or

unconsciously. And you might've done some work around this already, but no matter how much work I've done on this, I can tell you, especially when things get tight or when I get overwhelmed or when the shit hits the van, my old beliefs from my childhood come raging to the forefront and I need to really catch those things. So to be clear, I know there are other factors that are real that contribute to this conversation around money. Things like extreme poverty,

access or exposure to opportunity, systemic racism, sexism, and the other isms that definitely play a part. So I'm not trying to say this is all in your head or it's all about your beliefs. I'm only asking that you consider that your beliefs are contributing to your relationship with money. And then it might be easier and a little bit of a more short-term fix to focus on your beliefs while we continue to work on those other factors like sexism and racism and

extreme poverty and access to opportunity. I certainly believe that we need to fix those problems, but those feel harder to solve for me than the thoughts that are running around in my own brain. Okay. So here are some things that I've learned that work for me, and maybe they won't all work for you, but hopefully there's a nugget in here. First and foremost, I learned this from my coach, money is neutral. Really, most things are neutral, but money for sure is neutral. So this concept of too little or too much or not enough for most of us, again, I want to take extreme poverty and extreme limits around access to opportunities out of the mix for our conversation today. But if you're living in the United States and you're working and you've got income coming in,

the concept around too much, too little, not enough. All of that is perceptions and beliefs that we have in our head. I shared an example already, but money is neutral. There isn't a certain amount that works for all of us. I lived in Los Angeles and I can tell you there is a different amount of money required in order to live a lifestyle or buy a home than there are in other parts of the country. I can remember making a certain amount of money when I was single and feeling like I was living large and living the dream and making that exact same amount of money when Jay and I got married and had a kid and bought a house and feeling like everything was tight.

So one thing that I've learned is money is neutral and we have to be careful around all of the energy, meaning, and beliefs that we bring to the table when we interact with, think about money. Another belief that I've developed is that I can have a good life if I can prioritize what's important to me and that my money aligns, my spending aligns with those priorities and I live within my means. I've heard it said something to the effect of, if you want to know what somebody's priorities really are, ask their wallet. If you want to know what somebody truly values, look at where they're spending their money. This is true, by the way, with our time, where we spend our time,

look at our calendar. Those tell us a lot about our priorities and what we value as well. But for sure, where your dollars are going tells you what you're prioritizing. Is it in alignment with your values? Is it alignment with what you want to be prioritizing? And this concept of living within your means, I found stress and negative feelings about money had less to do with the actual dollar amount and more to do with where that money was going and whether or not I was living within the money, the amount of money that was actually coming in. So it's not the dollar amount or the money that's the freedom generator. It's the prioritization of and making sure that the spending of the money aligns with that and the living within your means that's the big difference maker.

Another thing I've learned is that money buys me options, not happiness. What I like about having money saved or making good money is that it gives me choices. I can leverage other people. I can delegate things. Silly example, but I hate cleaning my house. It is not the thing that I like to do. And I don't know that anybody likes to do it, but maybe for some of you, it doesn't bother you that much, but that bugs me. I have no interest in cleaning toilets on the weekend or scrubbing floors or whatever. And having money has allowed me to have the choice, the option to hire somebody else to do that for me. Now I choose to pay that person well, and I choose to hire somebody that I really like and care for. And so, you know, again, watch if you're having weird feelings about that, or if that makes me something in your head,

because for me, money just buys me options. It buys me choices. It buys me time back. But it certainly does not buy me happiness. So it's really imperative that we're on top of what those choices are, what options we choose, and again, going back into living within our means. I also would tell you that I've observed, and I mean, I'm not like rolling around in my money bath or anything like that. But people sometimes think the more money you have, the less problems you have. And that's just not true. Maybe different problems. I know I look at celebrities who have full-time nannies or whatever, and I'm like,

oh, that must be nice. That must be an easier way to raise kids. And maybe it is, maybe it isn't, or maybe it is, but they have a much different problem that they need to deal with than what I do. Like paparazzi chasing them everywhere all the time, which by the way, would make me way crazier than whatever challenges I need to deal with, with raising my kid on my own or with Jay, obviously. So, you know, I think this concept that the more money you have, the less problems you have is false and, and hasn't aligned with my experience. So that's another learning. And then finally, probably the biggest one for me is that money in my mind, this is going to sound strange, so bear with me. Money in my mind has a

flow. It's kind of like water, like a river. It comes and it goes, but it's constantly going. And like all of my other relationships, I give and I get. That flow comes in and it goes out. And sure, some things and sometimes are harder than others and some things and sometimes are easier than others, but I try to think of money as a flow, like water, like energy. Just because I don't have it or feel it right now doesn't mean it's gone or that it stopped. It's still flowing. And so, I don't know, maybe that's cheesy for you, but when things are tough or tight or when I get anxious or worried, that has been a good thing for me to hold on to is to know that I'm still in the flow. Money is still flowing.

I just might be, you know, at a little bit of a drought and a good rain needs to come. Okay, so regardless of what resonated with you or didn't, I want to give you some questions that you can be asking yourself to dig deeper into what are your beliefs about money. Because remember, beliefs are in the driver's seat, whether you like it or not. So asking yourself things like, what are my patterns around money? What keeps coming up? What do I keep doing? What do I keep doing? What do I keep experiencing?

And of those patterns, are there any that you want to continue and keep going forward? Are there any that you want to break? Asking yourself, what are the limiting beliefs that you're carrying around or carrying forward from your past about money? Again, this could be what you observed or didn't observe with your parents or experiences growing up, but what are the limiting

beliefs that you're carrying around unconsciously from your past about money? Asking yourself the question, if you're worried about money, what's the worst that can happen? Now, I know from a place of my privilege that my worst isn't that bad. There are bad things that could happen, like we could have to sell our house or move in with people, or I would need to get a job at Starbucks, or if they'd hire me, whatever. I can go down the rabbit hole, but more often than not for a lot of us, and again, in our privilege, when you think about what's the worst that can happen, it really isn't that bad. And by the way, it's probably pretty unlikely because again, as women, we tend to worry about absolute worst

case scenario. So if you're thinking about taking a risk with money, or if you're worried about money, like let yourself go down the rabbit hole of what's the worst that can happen. And then that leads me to my next question to be asking is what are my options? What are the options and choices that I have? What are my plan B's and C's and D's? Maybe this is just me. I'm a bit of a planner, but I just like knowing that there are some backup plans, especially when I'm thinking about doing something risky or when I'm starting to get a little bit stressed about money. That doesn't mean I need to pull all those levers. That doesn't mean I need to go to all those backups. Just knowing that they're

there sometimes can be really helpful for me. And then my last question is who can help me break any patterns or challenge and recreate any limiting beliefs that I might have about money. This could be a mentor or a friend or reading a book or doing an online course. I will share this personal belief here. Books, online courses, listening to people who generally talk about money, that's helpful, but you're getting advice that's meant for the masses. You might not fall into the category of the masses. I personally believe that everybody deserves a customized, individualized financial plan. And so another person that might be able to help you break any limiting beliefs or patterns is a financial advisor. Obviously find somebody you trust, word of mouth or an introduction from a friend or family member is a great way to do that.

And of course it could be your partner or, you know, for example, your single mom, maybe another single mom and talking through that. There are a ton of people around you, but really identifying who are some people who can help you break those patterns because if left to your own devices, it's going to be a lot harder. We often don't see things as clearly from the inside as somebody else with an outside perspective can. I will have a financial advisor or 10 on this podcast in the future. I know so many great financial advisors and so many great women who are financial advisors that one of my biggest challenges is deciding who and not wanting to hurt anybody's feelings by having people on.

But trust me, we will have financial advisors on to share general tips. But I think we're too quick to jump to results as it relates to money or even to behaviors, but it's our beliefs that are in the driver's seat. And that's where we need to start. And let's be honest, we are currently living through a lot of crises. Is that a word, crises? Multiple crises. You know what I mean? There's a health crisis. There's an equality crisis. There is a possible education crisis with everything going on with schools right now. Side note, my heart is out to all of the teachers and educators right now. You are in an impossible situation. And thank you for the work that you do. And parents and ladies, let's be kind to them and to each other. We are only responsible for our own choices and for our own children. So judgment

and comparison is just not a helpful thing in this situation. Okay. But I digress. So yes, we have a possible education crisis. And personally, I have a, is there enough wine and cheese in the world crisis? Like, are we gonna run out at some point? And we are dealing with a financial crisis. Whether or not it's directly impacted you or impacted you personally, it has become obvious that we all have more work to do

around our relationship with money. I'm going to share a few things, and none of this is meant to shame anybody or judge anybody. I've done so much work in financial services that one of the things that's become obvious is how too few of us Americans have an emergency fund, have that three to six months of expenses set aside in a savings account for times like this. It's become obvious that we need to do more holistic planning work. A lot of people are doing investment or accumulation work and not enough on their risk management financial plan. And it's really a good combination of both. If you got freaked out by the market or, you know, God forbid,

had to go on disability because of COVID or had somebody pass, this is what I'm talking about on the risk management side. It's life insurance. It's disability insurance. It's savings. It's making sure you and your family are in a good place when the shit hits the fan. And what's also become obvious is how quickly we all revert back to our limiting beliefs about money when times get tough. And again, this is true about other things besides just money, but that's become pretty obvious, which leads me into how money and our beliefs about it follow us into our relationships, specifically the people that we choose to spend our lives with, the people we choose to start businesses with, the people we choose to raise kids with, et cetera, et cetera. Basically all the people that we choose to commit to and to be in relationship long- kids with, et cetera, et cetera. Basically, all the people that we choose to

commit to and to be in relationship long-term with, we are bringing our relationships about money. They're bringing their relationships with money to the table. And a quick hint here, do not wait until you're married or in business or have a kid to have this conversation with your partner. It's maybe not first date conversation, but it is certainly for sure before your committed conversation. I won't go into the tactics about how to have that conversation. Episode three might be helpful there, as well as the family planning agenda that is on our website, NicoleKhalil.com, on episode three. But rather, I wanted to share

some things that I've learned. First, when you commit to somebody, you commit to that person and their beliefs and their behaviors and their results with money. So as an example, I'm more conservative. Jay is more aggressive. I'm more of a saver. Jay is more of a spender. Now I can spend some good money too, but Jay is more than I am. Money or being tight with money causes me so much stress. That's probably one of my biggest life stressors. Whereas Jay is more laid back. One thing I've learned from him, when things get tight, he often says, it's just money. We can always make more of it. Now that might sound flippant to you, but it does have a calming effect on me. My point is that we have different

approaches and that is true in most relationships. Most relationships have somebody who's more conservative and more aggressive, more of a saver, more of a spender. So we're bringing those things to our relationship. And we have an opportunity, I believe, to learn and grow from each other. It's not about changing the other person. It's about meeting somewhere in the middle in a lot of cases. And that has been great for me. Jay has made me feel less anxious about money. We have taken some risks or done some things as it relates to money because I borrow Jay's confidence sometimes. Flip side is we are much better savers than he was if left to his own devices and so forth and so on. I've also learned that while one person can handle the finances,

meaning like pay the bills or all of that, both people in the relationship, both partners, whether it's business or personal, must be involved. Okay. If you listen to nothing else I say today, listen to this, never abdicate the money. Always make sure you're talking about money. You're involved in the conversations about where you're spending your money. You get an update. Again, we do this quarterly, but keep talking, keep checking in with each other about money. Whether or not you're the person who makes the money, whether or not you're the person who handles the money, this is an ongoing, never ending conversation. Do not abdicate the money. Don't ever be in a situation where you have no idea what's going on or you don't know where the

money is or how to find it. Know your value. So whether you work at home, meaning you raise your kids and take care of the household and don't have a job outside of the home, you still have value. If your partner had to pay somebody to do all the things that you do, there is a dollar value associated with that. Know your value. If you're the primary income earner, which I've been in our relationship at times, if you're the secondary income earner, which I've also been at times in our relationship, know your value and then get together and communicate and decide together what that means, what that looks like. So as an example, maybe it's you have joint accounts, but you also have your own separate accounts. Jay and I have everything joint,

but we have our own spending accounts. And every month, a certain amount of money comes from our joint accounts into our spending accounts. And sometimes it's more money, sometimes it's less, sometimes we skip months, just depending on what's going on in life. But out of those spending accounts, we can buy whatever we want. And that has helped to relieve stress and judgment and being angry about what somebody else bought. So that's an example, but communicate and decide together what it looks like for you. So right now, Jay is contributing more into our household than I am. And that's been reversed at other times in our relationship.

But we still pay equally into our spending account. Now, there might come a point where we would make that different. Who knows? But the point is less about the logistics and more about the conversation and making sure you both feel good about what's coming in, what's going out, and whatever freedom or flexibility you have to make decisions and spend money and buy things. Update your budgets. Adjust as needed.

Be a team. That is probably the most valuable lesson I've learned about being in relationship with money with somebody else. So for a very long time, men have been at the center of money, but there is a transfer of wealth that's happening. All the statistics show it. More women are graduating from college. More women are getting their master's degrees. I think the last stat I read said four out of 10 households, the woman is the primary income earner. There are people inheriting, women inheriting money. There is a lot that's happening with money. And my hope is that there

will be an equality or an equaling that happens through this transfer of wealth. As it's happening, it's so important, though, that we as women check our beliefs about money. Because if we get the money, we need to be strong about how we feel about it, our beliefs around it, our behaviors about it, our results with it. It's so important. It is time for us to get comfortable. No, it's time for us to get confident with money. And it starts with you. You are either in control of your beliefs and your behaviors about money,

or it is controlling you. Money is not the root of all evil. The Bible does not even say that. It is the love of money that is the root of all evil. The Bible does not even say that. It is the love of money that is the root of all evil. And what I read about that, it's being obsessed with money. It's the fact that the idea of money owns you, that you're willing to do whatever it takes to get it. That is the root of all evil. Money is neutral. Money doesn't change you. It reveals you. Whether you don't have it, do have it, have a ton of it, it doesn't change you. It reveals you. What is our conversation today about money revealing to you about you? If it's uncomfortable, great. It's time we get uncomfortable about our beliefs because frankly, it's better than the

discomfort that many of us are already living with as it relates to money. And ladies, here's what I say. Go make the money. Know your worth and ask for it. Demand it or go out and create it for yourself. Live the vision. Build the lifestyle. Take the risks. Give it away. Build an empire. Liberate a community. Do all of the things. Put yourself in a position where you have choices and options and that you can make healthy choices and options. We have to stop living in fear about money and conversations about money. It is time. Go make the money. Go do the things. Go make a difference. Because this, all of this, is woman's work.